See into the future?

[Cyradix]

Coincidence or real?

http://www.rednova.com/news/display/?id=126649#121

 

[TdC]

muh. imo this works on the same principle as people claiming that their iPod on random play can sense their moods and play songs that fit them.

"oh look, the machine is spiking 1's. I wonder what has happened in the world that will fit this?"

Look hard enough for something and you will find it, regardless.

 

[gmloki]

I wonder which major events it has not spiked on

Interesting article regardless

 

[Brynn]

I think its a load of gibberish to be honest

How a little thingy of circuits and a chip no more complex can predict events which are world altering is a load of hooey.

Like Teeds said, if there was a spike today, the researchers would say "because of valentines day" if there was one in 2 months, 3 days they would scour the world to find some way of linking them together.

 

[OblongChicken]

I think this stuff is fascinating, and i'm very sceptically minded. I don't think anyone will find what i'm about to write very interesting unless you're in to this stuff. Though i wouldn't say i'm 'in' to it, it just strikes me as very interesting if there's anything to it, and i think dismissing it as 'gibberish' is rash. Anyway...


I always dismiss prophecies such as those of Nostrodamus on the grounds that people will look for the evidence to fit his vague ramblings. By its very nature, unless the prophecies are uncharacteristically precise in what they predict, by their very nature they should be ignored because any old event can be manipulated into supporting what was predicted. Yet there are many tests that have been carried out with consistent results that appear to conclude some inexplicable behaviour (the responses to provocative images spiking before the subject has seen the image being a good example). It is this consistency which causes me to think there is something there and that it's rash to dogmatically dismiss it all as gibberish.

First off, i would contend that the consistency of the machine dictates that it cannot be dismissed off-hand. That the scientists manipulate the evidence to fit their theories is a logical claim. I guess to refute that consistently one would need to come up with some kind of 'grade' of world events and calibrate that to the response of the machines. So events on the highest scale, such as 911 and the tsunami would be a 1. Diana's funeral might be a 1 or a 2, depending on what the machines are reading (in terms of global emotional outpouring, it would probably be a 1, but in terms of a 'serious' world event it would not rank with 911 or the tsunami), the bombing of Yugoslavia in 1999 might be a 2, along with the fall of Baghdad, the US elections might be a 3 and so on. That way, if the machine spikes on the scale of a 1 like it did for 911 for some minor event like a change in oil prices, it would appear inconsistent and that would undermine claims that it is reading some kind of global subconscious. Consistency is clearly the key to accrediting any validity to the claims being made.

On the other hand, there are numerous wars being fought over this planet that are never reported on because they do not relate to western concerns. Wars such as between Somalia and Eritrea (sp?), the Tamul Tigers and other various conflicts in the Indian Ocean, shady shenanigans that go on in South America and so on. On the scale of things, 3000 people dying on 11/9/01 was hardly as atrocious and what has been taking place in Darfur or somewhere similar. The term 'global events' is not the most objective term and is coloured by western media dominated by a corporate oligarchy (the name 'Murdoch' springs to mind) that chooses what to report on by its own criteria. The point being, if these machines only register global events that the western media deems 'global', it would suggest that maybe the scientists are just squeeing their evidential world view into their theory. After all, momentous events of a sort must take place around the world regularly enough for a prolonged straight line to be unlikely.

On the other hand, if the machines are not registering the event so much as the subconscious response (or 'pre-response'?) or collective emotional response to an event, then this could explain why horrific events that receive little coverage (eg. Darfur) do not cause a spike, as opposed to 911 which is surely the most momentous event to happen since the fall of the Berlin Wall. The events that receive the most coverage will cause the largest spike, as opposed to which is actually the 'worst/most important/best, etc'.

The strongest argument against the claims that the machine is reading some global sub-conscious is that every part of the world will have a difference perspective on events. There could be a spike caused by the people of South America at some event that the West never hears about, which would appear to cause the kind of inconsistency that would undermine the scientists' claims. Could an objective sense of consistency ever be defined for the results to be read against? Or maybe the machines only read the subconsciouses of those in proximity to the Eggs, so that it only reads a Western perspective anyway.

I realise i'm rambling now, but i think some kind of criteria for assessing its validity could be reached upon and scientific progress could be made here. And consider the implications; it would open up an entirely new branch of science to investigate, with unpredicable ramficiations. It could revolutionise our understanding of the universe and our place in it, and turn all our established philosophy on its head. That's why i find this stuff fascinating.

 

[Tom]

Did they record the 'free Wij' campaign? No. Fake.

 

[TdC]

if the machine(s) is a true random number generator on a massive scale it could in theory emit a stream of a zillion gazillion '1''s or '0''s consecutivly. what makes a 'spike' depends on the scale on which you define it. the science boffins don't manipulate the machine's results, they stand 'as is'. what they do is fit an event in the world to their findings. if I wake in the morning with an itchy toe, and fit a world event to it then I could claim that every time my toe itches something cataclysmic will occur, and dismiss it as a glitch if nothing happens. Ash's point being the most intresting here. terrible things happen in the world every day. thousands of children die terribly in the world every day. surely the machine can sense this then? surely the science boffins can't dismiss this as 'background noise'? on the world scale thousands of people die and are born every second. if, for example, 10 humans and 10 animals die per second, and a terrible fire occurs raising the average to 12 do you think anyone will notice?

btw, in TdC's world people haven't managed to make a true random number generator yet. the engines are random to a degree, just like a computer's CPU is accurate to a degree. it's simply a question of how much 'non-randomness' you're willing to accept in your machine, or where your error occurs in your computation that you don't mind it happening. if you have a number generator that produces a 0 or a 1 with a possible error of +/- 1 that makes it funky. if the error is 0.0000000000000000000000000000000000001, will that make it tolerable? is your '1' still a true '1' or not?

 

[Wij]

Did they record the 'free Wij' campaign? No. Fake.

\o/

 

[Athan]

I've not bothered to read the specific article linked but did read another on the same subject. It made absolutely no mention of exactly, or heck, even vaguely, how they were generating the random numbers. The usual PRNG? How often, if at all, was it reseeded ? Or are they actually using some source of entropy? If so is there any way that source could have been influenced ?

Also, it cited them saying "others have done such work and gotten the same results, just not published yet". Hohoho, what a lovely way to try and talk up your own work without giving any evidence. "Someone" "not published yet". Uh-huh.

-Ath
P.S. By the way I'm sceptical, duh .

 

[Athan]

I've not bothered to read the specific article linked but did read another on the same subject. It made absolutely no mention of exactly, or heck, even vaguely, how they were generating the random numbers. The usual PRNG? How often, if at all, was it reseeded ? Or are they actually using some source of entropy? If so is there any way that source could have been influenced ?

Having said that, a quick glance at the web site here does go into detail about the devices used to produce the 'random' numbers. The only bit I might question about that is: "They are subjected to calibration procedures based on large samples, typically a million or more trials, each the sum of 200 bits." Whilst this might sound good for the validity of the experiment it is inherently limiting the kind of data they output in the long term, hmmmm.
Still, I'm no expert on these things.

Oh and on looking it seems to be the same article I read before.

<sarcasm>Of course this could be evidence for The Matrix being real </sarcasm>.

-Ath, muttering about short edit time window.

 

[Tom]

Is there any such thing as 'random' in nature anyway? Perhaps its just a concept whose validity cannot be proven.


ooo, I feel all sagely now.

 

[Chilly]

what a load of cock - probably coincidental solar wind subtly effecting the equipment or some other random thing - I nearly totally refulse to believe stuff like this. But I am a scientist (supposedly) so I must be open to all ideas however ridiculous, but I refuse to believe this as there are several things that could explain it - especially the group meditation stuff - a room full of people is gonna produce temperature increase possibly fiddling the seed in the random box. Obviously if hes investigated all that stuff as well then id be more open but I doubt it.

Oh and Tom - nuclear decay is probably the most random thing we as humans can observe.

 

[nath]

Oh and Tom - nuclear decay is probably the most random thing we as humans can observe.

But does that mean it's actually random? Surely ultimately everything that happens has a reason, and as such it's not really *random*.

 

[Athan]

Ohhhhh "What is the definition of 'random' ?". That is actually a good one.

In the context of this it would be "A sequence of distinct data points, each of which can only be one of two possible values, nothing inbetween or outside the range, such that over sufficiently long times there should be equal numbers of them, but such that there is absolutely no predictability to the sequence.", or something close to that. Note it is not ONLY a lack of predictability, they are expecting the "50% heads, 50% tails" as well.

I'm no mathmo so I have no idea how you go about proving a given system is generating 'truly random data'. It'll be something to do with statistics no doubt.

-Ath

 

[Athan]

But does that mean it's actually random? Surely ultimately everything that happens has a reason, and as such it's not really *random*.

OMG, you're channeling Einstein!

. I refer to his comment about God not playing dice.

With Quantum Mechanics in play there ARE truly random events, things just become probabilistic.

This does of course assume QM is ultimately correct at least in part.

Toss a coin to find out if I believe it is .

-Ath

 

[nath]

Surely predictability is based around how much we, as observers, know. As such flipping a coin 100 times looks random but if we actually take in to account *every* factor governing it, from the muscles in the hand to the climate to the state of mind of the *ahem* tosser.

If you know absolutely every factor governing the toss, surely it's no longer random, it's actually entirely predictable. The question is, can't you apply this thought process to everything that we think is random?


edit: Ath, yeah I've heard about the random events in quantum computing - I hear it's been proven that they're random. However, I can't believe that something can happen in this universe for no reason whatsoever. Sure, maybe it's something we can never know the reason for and so it's effectively random, but there *must* be a reason for something happening, somewhere. Otherwise what is it, like magic/god's influence or something?

That's something I just don't believe, I just think it's caused by something we can't hope to understand yet.

 

[Athan]

Surely predictability is based around how much we, as observers, know. As such flipping a coin 100 times looks random but if we actually take in to account *every* factor governing it, from the muscles in the hand to the climate to the state of mind of the *ahem* tosser.

If you know absolutely every factor governing the toss, surely it's no longer random, it's actually entirely predictable. The question is, can't you apply this thought process to everything that we think is random?

Coin tossing is actually a bad example when talking about random events.

But anyway, the problem is, if you believe in Quantum Mechanics, you cannot "know absolutely every factor". Google for 'Uncertainty Principle'. To summarise/precis, you can never know the exact position of a particle AND it's exact current velocity. This is NOT a limitation in measuring methods but a fundamental Universal "you cannot do that" thing.
Now you start to see why Einstein didn't like QM....

-Ath

 

[Athan]

Would I totally b0rk your brain, nath, if I started talking about some current theories of Universe Formation, where it's random fluctations in a higher-dimension space causing 'membranes' to touch and release energy and such an event is what gave us our 'Big Bang' ?

Anyways, back to the point of this thread. The Global Consciousness Project could have something, but it seems their current scientifici practice and reporting is somewhat lacking. Thus I can't take them seriously. Given the very nature of what they're doing it's all too easy to draw false conclusions from the 'data'.
To give a somewhat orthogonal example. 'Cold' fusion. There was both the actual 'cold fusion' cited back in the late 1980s (Fleishman or similar springs to mind), and more recently 'sonoluminescence' fusion which is where you make bubbles collapse rapidly enough using ultrasonics to cause fusion. In both cases there is/was doubt over the data due to how they detected 'resultant neutrons from the fusion'. It's so hard to eliminate other factors from experiments. With something like this we need a number of highly independent teams retesting the experiment with different equipment to be sure there's not some inherent bias in the original.

But mostly whoever said "how about all the major events this thing has NOT 'predicted'" is on the simple track to laughing these guys out of scientific court.

-Ath, now off for a shower, so he'll stop spamming.

 

[dysfunction]

With Quantum Mechanics in play there ARE truly random events, things just become probabilistic.

In theory...

Just because the so called "randomness" can't be explained/measured/whetever doesnt mean its random...

 

[Athan]

In theory...

Just because the so called "randomness" can't be explained/measured/whetever doesnt mean its random...

It's in practice too, at least in some situations.

This is the current explanation for 'electron tunnelling' anyway, and that IS in use (or fought against) in the CPU you're using to access these forums and the one(s) it runs on.

Electron tunnelling is responsible for some of the heat wastage (through leaked current) in CPUs. It's a real, observed a hell of a lot, phenomenon. If it wasn't for quantum uncertainty and the inherently random/probabiistic nature of it the electrons wouldn't tunnel (get past a gap which they canNOT have the energy normally to do, they get past due to uncertainty in their energy and position).

Of course this assumes tunnelling is actually the correct explanation for the behaviour and not just a set of theories and equations that happen to explain the so-far observed behaviour. Physics is forever going "oh, actually..." .

So, when do we turn this fully into a metaphysical discussion?

-Ath

 

[Chilly]

indeed - im currently studying quantum theory in its various guises at uni and there is no way of predicting the kind of thing individually that is modelled by schrodingers wave equation for large populations of particles, it is purely a statistical approach. Whether or not the events themselves are truely random is indeed a very tough question, it would suggest that the causality is not absolute and that many physical models are fundamentally flawed.

Its all very wishywashy and goes into chaos theory which is basicly a system which has extreme sensitivity to starting conditions such that the outcome may well appear random but analysing the system sufficiently accurately will result in 100% predictability. Then you get into the explusion principle - you can NEVER (and i worked through the proof of the principle yesterday in a workshop) know the exact properties of a particle ie its momentum and position at the same time. You can only ever know either to a certain certainty. This would suggest at the quantum level there are events that are random (but only because we cannot observe the conditions accurately enough to know the outcome - maybe its impossible or the particles simply do have HAVE these properties..... ~brain melts~ ) and that we can rely on them to remain random.

meh - iv gotta go to uni for another quantum lecture

my brain hurts remembering all that

 

[Athan]

I do recall that when I studied physics (only upto and including 1st Year Uni mind you) that the texts were very insistent that the uncertainty principle was NOT just "you can't measure accurately enough" but a fundamental limit on the predictability. I'm having problems with terminology here.... The point is that even if somehow you DID know the conditions accurately enough the then-known physics said that due to the way things work you still couldn't accurately predict the future outcome as it was fundamentally not deterministic.

Still, that was largely at A-Level and the text books may well have been dumbing it down, and of course we're some 15 years on now so knowledge and opinion may have changed.

-Ath

 

[Chilly]

It is mathematically proven that the product of the expected value of momentum and position are less than or equal to 1/2 x "h-bar" where h-bar is a physical constant used throughout physics.

 

[Catsby]

Catsby hopes this link enlightens us all.

http://britneyspears.ac/lasers.htm

 

[Calaen]

Catsby hopes this link enlightens us all.

http://britneyspears.ac/lasers.htm

lmfao

 

[nath]

Google for 'Uncertainty Principle'. To summarise/precis, you can never know the exact position of a particle AND it's exact current velocity. This is NOT a limitation in measuring methods but a fundamental Universal "you cannot do that" thing.

My point was not so much that we, as members of this universe, can know everything that will happen, but that random events aren't possible as there's always a reason. Sure, effectively they're random since there are things that we can never know, so they may aswell be - but ultimately there's always a reason for stuff happening.

 

[Athan]

My point was not so much that we, as members of this universe, can know everything that will happen, but that random events aren't possible as there's always a reason. Sure, effectively they're random since there are things that we can never know, so they may aswell be - but ultimately there's always a reason for stuff happening.

We'll just have to agree to disagree on that one I think. Especially as it's starting to get somewhat existential.



-Ath

 

[Catsby]

Catsby notes that having no definition of random may be misleading this thread.

 

[Athan]

Catsby notes that having no definition of random may be misleading this thread.

Go on then....

I thought about offering one to use, but it all gets a bit handwavey. I'd assume mathematics has some formal definition of it, but I'm also sure I'd never understand the proof.

We could pull out dictionary URLs of course, but they still might not be correct for the discussion.

And anyway, to get back to the start of the thread, the definition isn't too important. The thing these guys were claiming I think is that SEVERAL of their RNGs all showed the same spike/anomaly at these times. Given the nature of their RNGs, scattered around the world, this really does seem strange (i.e. it's not just a single room having something affect it).
If they haven't simply massaged the figures in desperation of finding something, anything, then it may simply be they're the first to come across some new physical phenomenon. To throw a totally random (hah) idea out there, maybe some stream of dark matter/energy passed through the Earth at these times and had an effect on the quantum properties of the RNGs....

Oh, and part of their problem is that whilst they've found a correlation between real-world events and their RNG spikes that doesn't necessarily mean there is a causal link at all.

-Ath

 

[Chilly]

Nath - there is probably no way of knowing whether causailty is universal - ie everythign happens for a reason. Since we cannot measure tiny particles adequately to predict their actions we can never know if they would have followed a certain set of actions or they do actually follow a random pattern - it would seem strange that anything can act of its own accord, independent of stimuli (which is what it boils down to) in a seemingly random way - but as I say, how can we know? It will remain a myster of the universe I fear